Entertainment For Lively Minds
Gaps in my musical education
One of my musical highlights of the year so far has been discovering Half Man Half Biscuit. I'd heard individual tracks, but it occurred to me a couple of months ago that I'd never heard a complete album. A quick tweet to my Twitter chums produced recommendations from, amongst others, Andrew Harrison and Eamonn Forde (Achtung Bono, CSI Ambleside and Saucy Haulage Ballads, if you're interested) and, ever since then, I've been hooked.
Now, I'd always known that HMHB (see, I've even started using the acronym) were well thought of by people whose opinions I value, but I'd just never got round to listening to them. The success of this experience has led me to review which other well-regarded acts or albums I've neglected. I've never heard an AC/DC album, so Back in Black is next on my list. I will then be moving onto Public Enemy.
I suspect that we've done this before, but is anyone else prepared to admit to a huge gap in their musical education?
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the coemdy value of HMHB
the coemdy value of HMHB often camouflages the poetic genius of Nigel's lyrics - example :
National Shite Day
Pulling the ice axe from my leg
I staggered on
Spindrift stinging my remaining eye
I finally managed to reach the station
Only to find that the bus replacement service had broken down
After wondering to myself whether it should actually be called a train replacement service
I walked out onto the concourse and noticed the giant screen seemed to have been tampered with
Probably by a junior employee
Disgruntled commuters were being regaled with some dismal TVM
Involving a tug-of-love-custody-battle
Stockard Channing held sway
Down in the High Street somebody careered out of Boots without due care or attention
I suggest that they learn some pedestrian etiquette
i.e sidle out of the store gingerly
Embrace the margin
Fat kids with sausage rolls
Poor sods conducting polls
There’s a man with a mullet going mad with a mallet in Millets
I try to put everything into perspective
Set it against the scale of human suffering
And I thought of the Mugabe government
And the children of the Calcutta railways
This works for a while
But then I encounter Primark FM
Overhead a rainbow appears
In black and white
Shite Day
I guess this must be National Shite Day
This surely must be National Shite Day
Don’t tell me, it’s National Shite Day
Float… float on
Float… float on
Barry… Herpes
I got a letter from Stringy Bob
Still on suicide watch
Screws not happy
Spotted a Marsh Fritillary during association
Was roundly ignored
What news you
I felt sorry for him
He’d only been locked up for public nuisance offences
One of which saw him beachcombing the Dee Estuary
Found a dead wading bird
Took it home, parcelled it up, and sent it off to the rubber-faced irritant Phil Cool
With a note inside which read: “Is this your Sanderling?”
Another time saw him answering an advert in the music press
“Keyboard player required: Doors, Floyd, etc.
Must be committed, no time wasters”
You can guess the rest
I always imagined he would simply wander off some day into the hills
To be found months later
His carcass stripped by homeless dogs
His exposed skull a perch for the quartering crow
I folded away the letter and put it in my inside pocket
All of a sudden I felt brushed by the wings of something dark
May the Lord have mercy on Stringy Bob
Shite Day
I do believe it’s National Shite Day
It all points to National Shite Day
Someone’s declared it National Shite Day
Shite Day
My birthday! On National Shite Day
No bogroll, it’s National Shite Day
Cue drumroll, it’s National Shite Day
There is more rejoicing in heaven for one sinner
who turns to the True Path than for a thousand righteous men. Glad to have turned you on to HMHB. Now have a go at Earl Brutus.
Seconded
Of all the groups that have meant something to me over the years but are no longer around, Earl Brutus is the one I wish were still here, more than any other. Knowing they're gone for ever with no chance of a full reunion is a depressing thought. I would've dearly loved to have seen them live just one more time.
I envy anyone who has yet to investigate them - the sheer thrill of discovering how good they are will be something to savour.
thirded
my personal fave is "show me your mind" I've got a live version from Nme gig and it's brilliant
here's apost on Nick Sandersons sad passing
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/tribute-show-late-nick-sanderson-e...
Art Brut
Not quite in the lyrical league of HMHB but lots to put a smile on your face (and who can resist a singer called Eddie Argos). Good tunes and great musicianship complete the picture.
I don't really see music in that way...
as in feeling I have to have heard certain records. I don't actively seek out music... music tends to find me, if that makes sense.
If
you are going to try AC/DC get the early Bon Scott stuff.Far better and less of the "heavy metal" to them,they sound like a great bar band.
Seconded
High Voltage & Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap are Must-Hear AC/DC
and if you only get one, go for Dirty Deeds...
Dirty Deeds
is the one to get.
Long ago, a friend accused me of being a bit snobby about AC/DC, mostly because I only knew them from their more recent stuff and told me to buy this album. And I love it, never fails to brighten my day.
Let There Be Rock
Is, surely the entry point to Bon Scott era DC?
42-39-56
Highway to Hell
I'd say head straight for there. Top stuff.
Or get If You Want Blood, You've Got it
That will tell you everything you need to know about AC/DC Mk I
I think the consensus is ...
If Bon Scott sings on it, buy it!
Robert Wyatt & Soft Machine
That's my biggest musical gap. Don't know whether to start with the current solo stuff or go back to the very beginning.
Strangely enough, I too had a HMHB sized gap in my record collection until a couple of months ago when I made a plea on this very site to find out where to start. So hooked am I now (my favourites being Achtung Bono and Cammell Laird Social Club) that I am going to see them next year in Cambridge. Thank you, THE MASSIVE.
Greatest Misses
There's a good Wyatt 'best-of' called Greatest Misses, I used to have a copy somewhere. Its a brilliant intro to his work and gets you wanting more.
The first Soft Machine album has just been re-released which is also worth tracking down.
I'd also check out Matching Mole's first album, the band Wyatt put together following his dismissal from Soft Machine - which is just gorgeous.
I got my manager
to make me an A-Z of Half Man Half Biscuit CD; it's piqued my interest though I'm still yet to hear a full album by them. I'll admit to having huge gaps in my collection, but I have plenty of time to fill them.
Do it
before you get saddled with:
a long term life partner
offspring
a mortgage
a 'career' (i.e a job where they expect you to work yourself into the ground because you are a 'professional.')
Sorry - you may already have one or all of these things in your life. But seriously, filling the gaps in your music collection gets harder by the year.
If I sound bitter, old and defeated, that's because I am.
:-)
After years of ignoring it...
...hoping it would go away, I finally played The Marshall Mathers LP and enjoyed it rather more than I thought I would (given I'm more yer Floyd, Bowie, Gabriel-era Genesis type). Hugely ironic and self-aware, (though I can see that whistling over the heads of some of its opponents.), foul-mouthed, offensive and scatalogical - what's not to like.
I can't really see myself exploring much further into the world of Hip-hop though.
Richard Thompson & Fairport Convention
Never listened to a note, although I did recently create a playlist on Spotify to listen to.
much to my regret
i only got into barry adamson, last month.
since then, i've bought about six albums, and wondered why i'd never listened to him before... damn!
I preferred his work with XTC
although the legendary 'Rossmore Road/Win A Night Out With A Well-Known Paranoiac' single was a favourite in the days of the Annie Nightingale Sunday afternoon request show.
(gets coat)